Smash cake

1/2 of you reading this will know what I am talking about, but 1/2 of you will have no idea........
In America, there is a tradition that on a child's 1st birthday when you order a cake, you usually get a 'complimentary' smash smaller cake. The larger cake is for the guests and the smaller cake is for the guest of honor, and the purpose of this cake is for the 1 year old to smash this cake and make a huge mess.

Apparently it is a.......... ''sweet, tactile and completely photogenic way to include your child in a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to get down and dirty with his birthday cake''. The child gets the whole cake to him/herself and no fork is needed. Once presented with his sweet reward, he's encouraged to attack it with his fingers, fists or face. This table-manners-be-darned approach results in a face full of frosting and cake crumbs, cake covered fingers and cake on the floor. It also inspires grins all around.

So, there you have it... another American tradition that is not well known in the UK. I showed my cousin a picture of my niece with her smash cake - she was outraged and appalled... and this inspired me to do some research into the tradition of the smash cake.

Which side is the right side of the road to drive on?

In England, the steering wheel is on the right side of the car and you drive on the left side of the road.
In America, the steering wheel is on the left side of the car and you drive on the right side of the road.
Why? There are a lot of answers for this question.
 

In the 1700's in England men sat on a seat mounted on a wagon. What's more, he usually sat on the right side of the seat so the whip wouldn't hang up on the load behind him when he flogged the horses. (Then, as now, most people did their flogging right-handed.) So the English continued to drive on the left

Several hundred years ago, everybody used the English system. In the Middle Ages everyone drove on the left for the simple reason that you never knew who you'd meet on the road in those days; you wanted to make sure that a stranger passed on the right so you could go for your sword in case he proved unfriendly.

In the USA - When inventors began building "automobiles" in the 1890's, they thought of them as motorized wagons. As a result, many early cars had the steering mechanism-a rudder (or tiller), not a wheel-in the center position where the side of the road didn't make any difference. With the introduction of the steering wheel, a central location was no longer possible. Car makers just copied 'usual practice' and placed the driver on the curbside. Most American cars produced before 1910 were made with right-side driver seating although intended for right sided driving.
However - in 1908 Ford devised the Model T and it was the first car to feature a left-side driving position. By 1915 the Model T became so popular that other car makers began to follow suit.  

So there you are. But its kinda confusing especially since I am used to both .I did take driving lessons in England although because I moved I only took my test in America. Since then (10 years ago) I haven't driven in England. When I do visit England, it takes me a bit to get my bearings on which side of the road I am driving on when I get back to America though. And I'm sure it stops tourists from wanting to drive in this new country with its different rules. But there you go.

What time is it?

Daylight saving time, British summer time - is there a difference?
Twice a year time changes. In the spring, time goes forward by one hour ('Spring Forward'). In the winter, time goes back by one hour ('Fall Back'). Historically, this was carried out so that in the spring when time went forward, this allowed more daylight so that people could enjoy more outside activities during the daylight hours.

Recently, on October 31st time went back one hour in the UK. However - in the USA time does not go back until the 7th of November. This has led to a very confusing week for me as I keep forgetting about the 4 hour time difference rather than the 5 hour time difference.

Whose idea was it to change the time zone in UK at a different time than in the USA? I tried to google information about this but there really wasn't any significant amount of information about this, except to talk about the differences in the appearance of winter, and also the decision of parliament wanting things a certain way. So - basically it is what it is. And this English Yankee just has to figure it out for a week or something like that as long as I get my one hour extra to sleep in at some point lol.